Painesville City Manager Tony Carson, on Thursday afternoon, made official his decision to promote Anthony Powalie of Painesville Township to chief of the Painesville Police Department.
The title is effective June 28 and council will have the opportunity to vote on that appointment to make it permanent at the next regular meeting on July 21.
Powalie said his interest in becoming a police officer began as a young boy with two uncles on police forces, one in Cuyahoga County and one in Arizona.
“I remember growing up and seeing their uniforms and badge and saying, ‘That’s what I want.’ ”
After graduating from North High School in Eastlake, Powalie enlisted in the Army.
Just before troops deployed to Iraq for Operation Desert Storm, Powalie was placed on reserve and earned a job with the Lake County Sheriff’s Department as a corrections officer for seven years.
During that time he enrolled in the police academy, which qualified him for a part-time job with the Grand River Police Department, then a full-time position with Mentor-on-the-Lake for a year before being hired by Painesville in May 1997.
He was promoted to lieutenant in August 2010.
“Lt. Powalie has all the qualities needed to be an excellent police chief,” Carson said. “He has integrity, honesty and the willingness to bring new ideas to the department.”
Powalie said some of those ideas include a plan to change a negative perception outsiders have of Painesville.
“Our crime is no different than any other community,” he said. “But it’s how you address it. It’s how you bring the community in.”
A shift in the policing “culture,” to make his force a more thorough, compassionate crew, will help.
He said, as an example, that he would prefer taking the time to talk to victims of a home break-in in order to understand the event, connect it to similar events and help prevent future events like it rather than taking down the report quickly and heading back to the department.
The Latino or Hispanic community makes up 22 percent of Painesville, according to 2010 census data.
Powalie said he has reached out to that community by attending HOLA meetings, a Latino advocacy group.
“The Hispanic community is very open to talking to the police,” Powalie said. “The fear is they’ll get deported.”
He said the department is in place to protect everyone.
“If you come in with a desire to help people, ethnicity doesn’t matter,” he said.
Powalie has written several leadership articles for the national police resource website www.policeone.com including a two-part series, “Training for success despite diminished budgets.”
He has won awards including the 2007 Life Saving Award and 2008 Certificate of Recognition. He also instructs the Lakeland Community College Police Academy.
In addition to very pointed community outreach, he said more active officer recruitment is one of his ideas for improvement — reaching out to individuals who would help improve the force, rather than waiting for applicants to reach out to the department.
“The reality is, the community gives us the authority to do our job and somehow, along the way, we forget that,” Powalie said. “As police officers we need to understand we are here for them.”

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